Mike Fellon

The 1-8x magnification class sits in an odd spot. It’s supposed to give you true 1x speed for close work and enough top-end magnification to reach out past 300 yards when needed. That’s the promise, anyway. Reality is more complicated. Most shooters who think they need 1-8x power would actually be better served by a … Read more

The .450 Bushmaster was built for thick-cover deer hunting inside 250 yards, primarily in Midwest states with straight-wall cartridge restrictions. It hits hard, drops steeply past 150 yards, and gets used in timber where shots come fast. That creates a specific scope challenge: you need something that handles a 30-yard brush shot and still gives … Read more

This budget tier gives you access to four completely different scope philosophies. You can get a precision long-range FFP optic with turrets that actually track, a featherweight hunting scope with glass that outperforms its price, a competition-focused platform built for PRS stages, or an LPVO that costs far less than the top options and handles … Read more

The $500 mark sits at one of the more interesting points in the rifle scope market right now. Ten years ago this budget got you a basic 3-9x with capped turrets and a duplex reticle. Today the same money buys features that used to require twice the cash: first focal plane reticles, zero stops, locking … Read more

A quick detach mount only matters if it actually returns to zero. That sounds obvious, but I’ve pulled mounts off and put them back on dozens of times across multiple testing sessions, and the gap between “advertises return to zero” and “actually does it” is wider than most shooters expect. The whole point of a … Read more

The M1A was engineered as a battle rifle, not as an optics platform. That distinction matters when you start shopping for scope mounts, because the design choices that make it reliable (the gas system, the operating rod running alongside the receiver, the stripper clip guide that most receiver mounts displace) create a mounting environment unlike … Read more

I’ve been testing rifle scopes for over 10 years, and the 3-9×40 configuration keeps coming back into my testing rotation for one simple reason: it’s what most hunters actually need, even though it’s not what they think they want. 3x handles close shots in the timber. 9x reaches across clearcuts. A 40mm objective balances light … Read more

A buddy of mine called me last spring with the most common question I get: “Just tell me the best thermal scope.” Took me an hour to answer, and he wasn’t happy with the conversation. The truth is, a short-range hog rig isn’t a long-range coyote setup, and a clip-on scanning tool isn’t a precision … Read more